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You know the type. Selfish. Demanding. Probably fun and good
looking. But also completely unavailable except when he
(or she) wants to be. He takes all your time but then is
never there with a hug when you need one. Don’t let the
technology in your life become that manipulative boyfriend it
took you five breakups to finally ditch.

The thing about those terrible, dysfunctional relationships is
it’s never exactly clear how you got into them. You thought you
were just friends. You didn’t really care about him that much.
It's the same with technology: You had email, then Facebook, then
Twitter. Then maybe Snapchat and Instagram. Before you knew it,
you were deeply involved with your phone, checking it a dozen
times during dinner.

“We never really chose to have that relationship with
technology. We just kind of drunkenly hooked up with it. And the
next thing you know, you are like, well, you know, I could always
divorce him after the second kid,” jokes Priya Parker, the
founder of Thrive Labs, a
strategy and visioning firm, at a talk in New York City last
month as part of a series on how to live with technology called
New Tech City.

These days, we never want to miss a connection. We're
half-overwhelmed, half out of control trying to keep up with
every social media application and new device. “We behave like
desperate little twerps so grateful that Facebook or Apple or
Snapchat or Foursquare would invent this for us. Little old us.
And without thinking of how the invention can made to fit into
our life, made to amplify our dreams, made to push us further
down the road that we chose, we surrender and lose ourselves in
the invention and submit fully to what it asks of us,” says
Parker.

Trying to keep up with technology is like trying to earn love
from a person who doesn’t know how to love. It’s completely
maddening and can be very, very addictive. The good times are so,
so good. And the bad times are so, so, well, frequent.

By flipping on that smartphone in your pocket, you have the world
at your fingertips. “It is both an amazing creative tool and also
a completely overwhelming experience,” says Vincent Horn, the
founder of Buddhist Geeks. “Often people describe
being distracted…wandering for hours at a time: Wait, wait,
wait a second, what was happening here? Where did I go?”

What we have done is slowly allow the tech innovators of the
world to drive how we live, what we think, and how we think about
ourselves. We drive our use of technology based on what is
invented, not what we need.

In other words, that terrible, sexy, maddening boyfriend is
always calling the shots. No bueno, my dear, no
bueno.

“What I want to suggest to you tonight is a completely different
way of how to live with technology in which you chose how you
want to live first, what you want your hours to be, what kind of
space you want to have in your mind, what kind of tasks you most
enjoy doing. And then, to use technology selectively, wisely and
carefully to help you fulfil that purpose” says Parker.
“You as technology’s elusive, badass, upper-handed
boyfriend, and not the other way around.”

It's time to have a serious talk with yourself. Be honest about
what you are looking for, and how technology can benefit you, not
distract you. Take the reins to your own sanity back. Here are
Parker and Horn’s tips for getting that conversation started. Go
for it. You deserve better than to be obsessing over a beautiful,
self-centered, manipulative boy -- or your Facebook feed.

Conduct an audit of your technology habits.
Write down, in real time, what technology you are using, when,
and for how long, says Parker. Keep track of how many minutes
you are on Facebook, how many tabs you have open at any one
time and how often you switch back and forth between business
and personal tasks. Then, be honest with yourself as to whether
your use of technology and social media is in line with your
purpose or whether you are being a hypocrite.

DTR with your email. You have been “hanging
out a lot,” but you don’t know if he is seeing other people.
You deserve better. Time to define the relationship, or "DTR."
Parker says you ought to do the same thing with your email. You
call the shots. Make sure that each morning, you take a brief
amount of time to establish your priorities for the day before
looking at your inbox, which Parker calls a “to-do list made
for you by everyone else in the world without your
permission.”

Have designated check-in times with your
email. You can’t run a business if you are stewing in
your inbox all day long. Have times that you check your email,
and then have times when you focus on tasks. An hour and a half
is an ideal amount of time to be focused on a task, says
Parker.

Use those away messages. Not just when you are
in the Bahamas. Parker likes to include a physical location in
her away messages even if she is away from her computer for
only a couple of hours. For example, if she is in a work
meeting, Parker will write that she is “in a visioning lab in
Brooklyn.” Not only does that tell people that Parker is not at
her computer, it also gives her work a sense of legitimacy and
reminds people what Parker does.

Practice focusing. Your brain is like your
bicep, says Horn. If you practice bringing your attention back
to the task at hand, your brain’s ability to focus will
strengthen at a biological level. Parker and her husband set
aside days where they gather a group of friends to do gather
for 12 hours at a time without accessing their phones.
Technology did not make human beings distractible, says Horn.
“Technology has taken that and given it a whole bunch of
crack,” he says. You are going to have to pump your brain
attention muscles stronger than ever to stay on track.

Don’t throw away all men because one bad apple broke your heart.
Notably, neither Horn nor Parker suggest living without
technology. The answer to an unsuccessful relationship is not
being alone forever. Instead, seek a relationship with technology
that will support your purpose, your passion and your ability to
get things done.

“We have to be able to work with our technology consciously and
not create a kind of digital dualism, as Nathan Jurgenson describes
it, a kind of way in which we split off technology and our
lives,” says Horn. “If we pathologize technology, we are
pathologizing part of our own experience, part of ourselves.”